Hi everyone! It's been a while, but here is the long-awaited first
chapter of my new Detective Conan fic! I'm trying something different
this time – being more true to the original Japanese. This means that
I'm going to attempt to use the honorific suffixes properly, and write
the characters' names with the family name first, and then the given
name. This fic will prove to be much longer than "House of Horrors,"
mostly because it spans a much longer period of time, as you will
shortly find out.

I don't own Detective Conan or Magic Kaito… but wouldn't it be cool for me if I did?

Anyway, without further ado… Where in the World is Kaito Kid?

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Chapter 1: It's Addressed to Who?

It
was a couple days since school had ended for the summer, and the
Detective Boys were spending a relaxing day at the park. They laid on
the grass, and watched the clouds go by. Some of the clouds formed
recognizable shapes, but most were just blobs of fluffy whiteness.
Ayumi sat up and looked at the three boys. They could tell something
was bothering her, but only Conan found his voice.

"What's wrong, Ayumi-chan," he asked.

"I
was just thinking about how my camp starts next week," she explained.
"I'll be so busy, I won't have any time to spend with you guys."

The
other boys sat up now, too, their faces showing pensive expressions.
"Yeah," Genta said. "My mom said she wants to take me shopping in the
next couple days for some new camp stuff…"

Ayumi smiled sweetly at Conan. "What are your plans for the summer," she asked.

They
sat for a while longer, reminiscing about their adventures over the
last school year. Before they knew it, the day ended, and they were
forced to part ways.

Shinichi left thinking about how nice it was
going to be to have a little respite from the seven-year-olds.
Normally, he would have seen if his usual summer job was still
available, but that hadn't been an option anymore for some time now.
Hanging out with his best friend was certainly the next best thing,
though, despite the fact that he couldn't really be himself around her.

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When
Conan returned from seeing his friends off on their first day of camp,
he found Ran standing by the mailbox with a puzzled look on her face.

"What's wrong, Ran-neechan?"

She looked down at him and smiled. "It's really nothing, Conan-kun…"

"Well,
I'm here if you want to talk about it… all my friends left for camp
today." He knew better than to believe her, but went into the apartment
anyway. He sat on the couch and waited patiently for her to come in and
explain what had her all worked up.

A few minutes later, she came
in. She set most of the mail down on the table to be sifted through
again later, but kept one envelope in her hand. Conan managed to get a
quick glance at it, only to notice that there was no stamp in the
corner. He could also barely tell that the addresses of both the sender
and the recipient were missing. The sender had dropped it off
personally, and something seemed eerily familiar about the handwriting.

Ran
sat down on the couch. Conan leaned over to get a better look at the
envelope, and was about to reach out and take it from her hands, when
she pulled it away. "It's not addressed to you, and anyway we don't
know who it's from," she explained. "Why would they send it here? Is it
possible the sender knows that the best way to get to Shinichi right
now is through me? That doesn't make sense, though… because even I have
trouble getting in touch with him…"

Conan stiffened at the mention of his other name. Now he had
to know what was in the envelope. If Ran wasn't going to let him get a
good look, he'd just have to wait until later, when she'd be too
exhausted to care.

The rest of the day passed quietly. Kogoro
spent it the way he usually spent his days – in front of the television
with a can of beer. Ran and Conan found various other ways of amusing
themselves. Both of them had other things on their mind, though, not so
surprisingly all related in some way to the mysterious envelope.

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Conan
snuck back downstairs after he thought the other two were asleep. He
discovered upon reaching the living room that he was in fact only half
correct, though. Sitting by the window, silhouetted by the light of the
moon, was the figure of the woman he loved. He watched her for a few
seconds before remembering his real purpose for returning to the room.

Ran
jumped when she heard paper rustling behind her. She turned with a
knowing smirk to confirm to herself who it was. "You really want to see
what's inside that envelope, don't you Conan-kun," she asked.

"Don't you?"

"It's not addressed to me."

The boy continued to search the stacks of paper on the coffee table. "Where did you put it?"

"I'm not telling, until you explain to me why you want to see it so badly." She crossed her arms across her chest.

"Didn't
you think something seemed strange about the handwriting on the outside
of the envelope," he asked without pausing from his task.

She
didn't want to give him the satisfaction that she had noticed other
weird things about it, like the light scent of flowers coming off of
it. She answered his question with another – the one that was still
bothering her since she first saw the object of their discussion. "Why
would the sender have delivered it here?"

The boy stopped and
looked up at her, not at all surprised that she was still hung up over
that little detail. "I don't know," he replied, "but I'm sure
Shinichi-niichan wouldn't mind much if we looked at it… We might even
be able to take care of it, so that we don't have to interrupt his
already busy schedule…" He watched her intently, waiting to see if that
would be enough to convince her.

She looked back out the window
towards the street. It would be awfully rude to open someone else's
mail, but she was hungry with curiosity of what the mysterious envelope
contained. After a couple minutes, she relented. She sat down at her
father's desk and pulled it out of the top drawer, and then turned on
the small desk lamp. Conan came over, and she pulled him up onto her
lap. He blushed momentarily, until he looked down at the single phrase
written across the middle of the back of the envelope.

To: Kudo Shinichi

When
Ran picked it back up and turned it over to release the seal, Conan
also caught a whiff of the flowery scent. He had nearly put one and one
together, when she pulled out a piece of paper on which something was
written in the same oddly familiar scrawl.

Dear Detective,

On
the eve of the summer solstice I will take the first honor of the
leader of the Satsuma Rebellion. With its lightning strikes I will
begin my great world tour.

Kaito Kid

Both pairs
of eyes widened at the short piece of text on the page. Shinichi hadn't
even needed to look at the signature to confirm his assumptions.
Rather, he immediately started to try deciphering it so that he could
formulate the next step to take.

Ran didn't know what to think.
She did know, though, that it was getting to be too much excitement for
one night. She folded the page back up and stuffed it back into the
envelope. "Okay, Conan-kun, are you satisfied now?" He nodded, light from
the desk lamp reflecting off his glasses. "Good, then I think it would
be a good idea for you to get back to bed. We'll look at it again in
the morning."

He went back to his room, even though he had no
intention of going to sleep right away. Instead, he pulled out another
sheet of paper and a pen, and transcribed the message, so that he could
keep working on it.

After Conan wrote the riddle out again, he
realized it wasn't all that difficult after all. Summer solstice
referred to the longest day of the year, which hadn't come yet, so he'd
have to look at the calendar to find out exactly which day it would be
this year. The other part was a little more challenging. He figured
"the first honor" and "lightning strikes" probably meant the object of
Kid's heist would be a weapon. That made two tasks for him to complete
the next day – find a calendar to see how many days he had, and find
the location of the treasure. The last phrase still bothered him,
though, and he went to sleep hoping that solving the rest of the riddle
would help him figure it out.

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End Chapter 1

A/N:
So, that's it for this installment. Chapter 2 is well underway, if not
nearly complete. I don't know the last time I was this far ahead before
posting… Anyway, if you haven't caught on to the story's title, I'm
sure you will after the next couple chapters.

The author would like to thank you for your continued support. Your review has been posted.